New ARCN act will strengthen research institutes in Nigeria – Prof Sharubutu

Professor Garba Sharubutu, the executive secretary of the Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria (ARCN), has explained how the new ARCN act, initiated by Senator Abdullahi Adamu, passed by the National Assembly and assented to by President Muhammadu Buhari recently will strengthen agricultural research institutes in the country.    What exactly does the amended ARCN act […]

Professor Garba Sharubutu, the executive secretary of the Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria (ARCN), has explained how the new ARCN act, initiated by Senator Abdullahi Adamu, passed by the National Assembly and assented to by President Muhammadu Buhari recently will strengthen agricultural research institutes in the country. 

 

What exactly does the amended ARCN act recently assented to by the president intend to achieve? 

We targeted mainly three to four things. Number one is the fact that we are going to harmonise the Board for unification. Let people not be surprised that the whole research institutes in this world will now be coordinated by a single board, the CGIR. That is a consultative group for research institutes for the whole world. We are members.  

In fact, the ARCN is a coordinating research institute for West and Central African sub-regions. So in a similar way, this bill or act seems to achieve that by unifying the decisions to be dispatched centrally. It has also made provision for technical committees at the various research institutes and colleges for them to be able to advise the management on what to do. Management will not be seen to be operating without anybody supervising them. So there is a room for technical committee. 

The second aspect of it is that since the establishment of the federal colleges of agriculture, about 16 of them in number, they have never had a board. In fact, there was no statue establishing them. So they were actually running without any board or law. All along, they were just attachments of the various research institutions.  

Anytime we go for accreditation, we rely on the laws that established their composite research institutes, which give the research institute the right to establish training colleges. So by doing so we hang on those, but you see, an agency that is independent and has its own budget should not be seen to be hanging on the law that was established by other agencies.

In the wisdom of this initiator, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, there is a need for us to establish under this act, the various colleges of agriculture. More so, five of these 16 colleges of agriculture were actually running under the department in the ministry. So you find out that their staff, their promotion, their condition of service, retirement age and everything was subjected to the same civil service procedure. So staff are being posted to them, lecturers are being posted from the ministry, so with the establishment of this law, they now come under the key academy structure as envisaged.

Thirdly, most of our research institutes were also producers of technology and there was a need for us to market this technology, but as it was, there is no way we can market these technologies because we would be doing things illegally as we did not have the right to go into marketing. So this law established spin-off companies for us to be able to operate. 

Before now, there has been controversy as to why some of our colleges of agriculture are establishing consultancy outfits and it has been a subject of serious debate. In the wisdom of this act, there is now a need for us to actually establish spin-off companies, with the view to making sure that they now market their products, not as part of the core mandate of the institute, but as a branch so that the revenue generation capacity will now be increased. This is because, subsequently, what we are targeting is to beat our chest to say some of the technologies we have developed have been marketed. So the issue of our research findings being on the shelf will now be totally wiped out. For example, if the Cocoa Research Institute is able to come up with viable seedlings that are disease resistant and climate smart, you will find out that because of the inability of off-takers to come and take this, these products will now be handed over to the spin-off companies and they will go into multiplication and sale. 

If the National Veterinary Research Institute produces vaccines, the production of vaccines will now be taken over by the spin-off company so that they will do the marketing, and the research institute will now be allowed to concentrate more on the issues of their own research, rather than doing one thing or another.

Some of our research outstations are not actually doing very well because all activities seem to be concentrated at the centre. Some outstations are just there, either for seed distribution or extension. Does the bill look at this aspect too?

Yes. We will ensure that we are not just concentrated on the headquarters, we are also establishing outreach centres and strengthening our own outstations in such a way that we will be able to undertake their research, be it direct research or adoptive research. For example, you will find out that for our root crops, a research institute is stationed in Umudike, but ginger and Irish potato do not grow in that place. 

To address this issue, we have an outstation in Kachia for ginger and one in Jos for Irish potato. Now, this act will make sure that we concentrate development in this area so that our research institutes will be spread. It is the same thing we are also trying to do with our cereals. It was in Ibadan, now the headquarters moved to Badegi in Niger State, but that does not mean the one in Ibadan should be allowed to rot away.

Finally, of course you know that it is going to reduce cost. Instead of you having a proliferation of boards from one place to another, you know that these boards have further been reduced to a single board with professional membership that is supposed to drive the agricultural sector.

What about the issue of funding?

This bill went together with that on the endowment for fund. Again, I don’t know what we will do to Senator Abdullahi Adamu. Honestly, maybe because he has been in the area of agriculture for so long, he has all the wisdom. Rather than make provision for a separate funding only for research institutes, in his wisdom he said let there be another act that will establish an agricultural development fund. 

This agricultural development fund is supposed to harmonise all the various sources of revenue that are agric-related so that we will have a TETFund-type of organisation, where the research institutes, colleges of agriculture  and universities of agriculture will draw from. But most importantly, those that are into processing will also draw from it and every industrialist will now have the chance to come to the development fund, depending on what he wants to do. 

So there is a separate bill for that already passed at the Senate. It has also been concurred at the House of Reps. We are praying that very shortly, the minister may decide to push it further for presidential accent.